Java, having been developed
in 1991, is a relatively new
programming language. At that
time, James Gosling from Sun Microsystems and his team
began designing the first version of Java aimed at programming home
appliances which are controlled by a wide variety of computer
processors.

Gosling's new language
needed to be accessible by a variety of computer processors.
In 1994, he realized that such a language would be
ideal for use with web browsers and Java's connection to the
internet began. In 1995, Netscape
Incorporated released its latest version of the Netscape browser
which was capable of running Java programs.

Why is it called Java? It is customary
for the creator of a programming language to name the language
anything he/she chooses. The original name of this language
was Oak, until it was discovered that a programming language already
existed that was named Oak. As the story goes, after many
hours of trying to come up with a new name, the development team
went out for coffee and the name Java was born.

While Java is viewed as a
programming language to design applications for the Internet, it is
in reality a general all purpose language which can be used
independent of the Internet.